The Crazy Hard

Last Sunday night, I wrapped on my most recent short film.

If my last blog post didn’t already clue you in, this was the most complicated project (of my own) I’ve ever worked on. It involved a lot of characters, a small crew, and a whole bunch of locations.

But. It. Got. Done.

I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I once heard someone say that “The only people who fail in this industry are the ones who give up.” I’ve come to learn that’s completely true. It’s not that people can’t make movies. Anybody can. But they don’t because it’s too crazy hard.

If you’re directing/producing your own indie (which you will if it’s your first foray into this world) you’re managing everybody and everything that has anything to do with what, in the end, might just be a few minutes of film. And those who’ve worked on films know that hundreds of hours could easily go into creating just a few minutes.

Once you get past dwelling on the crazy hard, though, you get down to just doing... and the magic of starting to do something is that, once you’re in it, it doesn’t seem so hard. Not that you’re not exhausted, but once it’s happening, it takes on its own momentum. Before you know it, you’ve wrapped.

If you’re interested in film (and if you read this blog, you must be) all I can say is: no matter what the frustrations, stick with projects and see them through.

Start with simple ones. Maybe two or three friends to help as a crew, just a few characters, and hopefully just one location.

Then start to make it a little more complex, one project at a time (starting with the crew that will help make the end product look more professional). You’ll learn how to juggle more things than you thought possible, but most importantly, you’ll learn that making a film, beyond the crazy hard, is completely doable. Just one step at a time and a willingness to be exhausted for a while.

My last short was a big challenge. I didn’t only learn about locations, which I wrote about last time, but I learned about organizing necessary transportation and food for big groups (your responsibility, especially if they’re working for free), picked up some lighting tricks, and got hands-on experience working with different members of the crew. I learned about working with a director of photography and scheduling my shot lists according to daylight. I learned that, when short on time, there are certain shots I could cut to save time (and, by extension, certain details that didn’t need to be in the script, which will better inform my writing). I also learned about pinpointing the shots that were absolutely necessary.

But, long story short, these are all things I learned by actually making the film. In a nutshell, the most important thing I learned is that, despite the challenges of bigger, more complicated, and more polished productions, I need to just keep on diving into them and getting more and more done. As a result, what I do will become more and more professional.

I now have hours of video and audio footage to sift through, to begin the editing process. That means there are a few months to go before this project is totally done. But when I wrapped last Sunday, I felt proud knowing that I’d pulled off filming my most ambitious and challenging project to date. I grew as filmmaker because of it. What’s more, I’m now more ready to take on the crazy hard.